Molly
by melaniec67
Summary: Sherlock Holmes meets Molly.  He fancies her right away, but he's never been good at talking to girls. I haven't seen season 2. Opinions please, just don't tell me what happens. Thanks for reading.
1. Chapter 1

Molly

The first girl to kiss Sherlock Holmes told him she'd done it to make him shut up. One minute, he was trying to explain that night's homework to her, the next she had pulled him and kissed him, hard. He paniced a little, then his mind went blank.

It turns out, the girls in Advanced Biology didn't think Joanne could ever get that weird younger kid to kiss her. They'd offered her a challenge; could she do it? She could, she told them, and she would.

And she did, and for the rest of the term, they kept at it. They were usually in the library or the lab, because he spent hours there after school and nobody else did. To Sherlock, labs never stopped meaning sex. Sex and the promise of it, wanting it the way a sixteen-year-old boy would. The smells the long, cold tables, the florescent lights, it all came together to be his biggest turn-on.

The first time Sherlock saw Molly Hooper, she was in the lab-like morgue wearing a lab-coat, the knee-length kind and it was fastened to the last button. She wore her hair pulled back in a ponytail, protective goggles. Sherlock just stood and looked at her, couldn't speak. He was afraid he might say the wrong thing.

No-one excited him more than a a girl in a lab coat. A girl in a lab-coat was a girl wearing something that looked serious, blank, cold. She was dressed for work. A girl in a lab-coat could be all soft and curvy or she could be willowy and svelte; he'd have to get her out of the white coat to see. Those white coats just begged to be ripped off and thrown to the floor.

This Molly Hooper wore high boots which Sherlock also loved . Black boots, leather, he liked those. How did anybody know if she had anything on underneath her cover-up? She could pierced, tattooed, shaved. Shaved?: Sherlock shook his head, he didn't like that. He had to get rid of that image.

Sherlock Holmes was still standing in the doorway of the morgue. when Molly, shrouded in mystery walked toward him. "Hello. Can I help you?"

She was both pretty and plain. Certanly pretty, just plain pretty nothing you'd notice. Glasses, pulled-back hair, all the more to undo. "I believe you can."

"I hope so." She sounded like she wanted to be helpful. She waited. "What is it that you need."

He started looking past her shoulder to a spot on the wall. "I need a female, around thirty, no smoking, drinking, etc."

She laughed a little, "You need a WHAT? Are you sure you're in the right place."

Oh God; did he say that! He started looking all around; everywhere but right at her. Hs started talking very, VERY fast.

"I need a dead body. A dead woman, as fresh as possible. Must be between twenty-five and thirty-five, and 'clean-living'. Have you got one?"

She was looking at him, staring. Her eyes looked wide. She may have stepped back from him just a little.

He tried to sound like a man on a mission, not like some crazy perv.

He looked right at her. "I need to run some experiments on the adrenail glands of a recently dead woman. I'm not mucking about this time. Scotland Yard needs my help, and I need your's. I've got permission and everything. Check with them upstairs, they know me. I'm Sherlock Holmes. You must be new here; are you?"

Her being new might work to his advantage. If she was new, nobody would have warned her about him. This meant she might be more willing to help him and more open to his advances.

"Just started yesterday. I'm Molly Hooper." She had s tiny voice.

Not exactly forthcoming, this Miss Hooper. Sherlock snapped into all-business he didn't have time for this. "Well Molly Hooper, have you got a nice body for for me?"

Molly giggled. "Actually Sherlock, I just might. I'll check."

She walked away from him toward the drawers where the bodies were kept. He watched her. If she was wearing a skirt, then it was a short one; best kind. Again, it was nice that the coat left so much to the imagination.

In no time, Molly wheeled her over on a gurney bearing literally the perfect subject. Covered with a sheet, the woman looked very peaceful; as if she'd pulled the sheet up to her chin for a wee nap. The woman had strawberry blond hair and that really beautiful skin some heavier women have.

"Ms. Laura Oxbridge, aged 32." Molly read off a chart. "Says here that she died of a ruptured appendix. Fair haired, fat and fertile, isn't that who they used to say?

"Who used to say what" Sherlock was confused.

Molly looked very uncomfortable. "They used to say that women who were in the twenties and thirties um, you know. . . . Women ' of child-bearing age."

She was looking at the floor, twisting her hair.

"Women ' of child-bearing age who had fair hair and were, well, heavy were more likely to get appendicitis than other people. Don't know why they said it, but they used to..."

"Bunk! Don't believe it. My brother's appendix turned on him last Winter, and he's not what I'd call fair-haired. It's just the body getting rid of something it never needed anyway. Mycroft said it hurt like hell, but he's never been good with pain."

Sherlock congratulated himself. He'd just assured her that he thought outdated assumptions were laughable, and without meaning to, worked in a dig at his older brother. Saying that Mycroft wasn't good with pain might suggest a certain bravery in him.

"Laura Oxbridge's sister brought her in today around two pm. The sister said that Laura'd called because she felt horrible and didn't think she should be alone. By the time the sister'd arrived, Laura'd already called the doctor. She was in Emergency for four hours waiting for a surgeon, but they didn't get to her. Pretty busy for a Thursday. afternoon."

She was very new, new to the city too. Some towns might have afternoons, but not city hospitals like Saint Bart's.

"No, not really. This place can be crowded in the afternoon, that's when all the kids who've injured themselves one way or another come through. People who were told to come back if things don't get better come in then too. People who get found by the postman or a neighbor looking in or the landlady. . .."

He stopped. He'd started thinking about when people would start missing him, so he'd stopped.

"I hate to hear that kind of thing. It makes me sad, and nervous. I live on my own see."

"I do too, I'm an appalling flatmate. If I had cats, maybe the pitiful hungry mewling might be a sign that something was amiss in my apartment"

"Either that, or the smell!" Molly seemed to regret those words as soon as she'd said them; even so, she giggled. "Sorry!"

"Actually no, probably not. " Sherlock was starting to get a little nervous. He started looking at his hands; why did he do that? "I do a lot of experiments at night in the flat, and some of them involve some noxious things. The hallway must smell god-awful."

"So, what is it that you do?"

This was the longest conversation he'd had with a woman, ever! She actually asked about his experiments, and women never did that; not even the ones in lab-coats. It was time to sound important.

"I am THE consulting detective, the one and only. If Scotland Yard is lucky, I'll find out what they need to know. They stick to their obsolete methods, but I don't. Today they need me to run some experiments on a recently dead woman. I should have results by the time their Medical Examiner has shown up for work."

"Sounds interesting." Molly really did sound interested. "Are you going to be here late?"

"All night, I assume."

"Yeah, me too. I've got the overnight. I was about to go get something to eat. Want anything?"

Most of the people who worked in the morgue seemed to like ignoring him; alright with him if they did. They did their work, he did his. Nobody offered to get anything, but he never ate while he worked anyway. However, he needed coffee.

"I don't eat when I'm working, wastes energy and time."

"Don't you get hungry?" Was that concern in her voice?

"I do, when I'm finished. When I'm finished, I'm starved! I've eaten whole loaves of bread when I've finished. I've eaten two dinners in one sitting." Funny thing to brag about, Sherlock supposed.

Molly was laughing. "Coffee then?"

"Coffee, yes! Black, two sugars."

"That's sweet."

"Sweet? What's sweet?" Nothing about him had ever been called 'sweet'!

"How you take it, your coffee I mean; dark but sweet. I need a little milk, to smooth the edge."

"I like the edge." He'd said that last thing just to say

And she was gone, off to get the coffee. She left him to his thoughts.

Melanie Campbell © 2012 10 of 10


	2. Chapter 2

When Sherlock met Molly Hooper, he'd stayed in the lab until three am. She'd gotten him one cup of coffee, and then another. The first, weak, cold hospital coffee was horrible, but just as he'd requested it, black, two sugars. The second time, she'd brought three sugars for him to mix in.

"No Molly, this isn't my coffee. My coffee has two sugars already in it."

That had come out louder than he thought it would, or maybe the room was very quiet.

She just stared, Her eyes were brown; he felt like he should have noticed that before. "Sorry."

"No, that's just me, I like what I like."

He smiled;. His smile, he'd heard, was 'enigmatic". Maybe that would suggest he could sound deadly serious when trying to be witty.

Her coffee was on the table. It looked light, like cafe au lait. He guessed she might like those drinks that were fluffy with milk foam, lattes.

There was a cafe he liked run by a well-known criminal where they made the best espresso. They knew him there, he could order two at a time there, he could get a full-sized cup of espresso and pour in plenty of sugar. Molly would like their lattes strong coffee smoothed out with fluffy milk.

For just a moment, he tried to imagine Molly drinking a cafe latte and getting foam around her mouth. Not too sexy, her mouth was small, thinnish lips. Ah, well.

Sherlock's brother, Mycroft, had once told him that he shouldn't go on and on about things like science when talking to women. Mycroft didn't know about tutoring Joanne in Biology, which proved that his gem of brotherly wisdom didn't hold true. Later, Mycroft had told him that staying too quiet wasn't good either. Well, Sherlock's dear brother was very close to a second divorce, and his misstress had cut him off last month. So, what did he know?

Sherlock knew that, at university, the beautiful Jane had found his silences "intriguing".

In that those last hours at the morgue, he tried a little silence. Talking had started tripping him up, and he had experiments to run. Molly tolerated his silence. Around 2 am, Dr. Barlow came early for his shift He wished them good morning, nothing more.

Wordlessly, Sherlock cursed the doctor. Even while he worked, he had felt a thrill being alone there with a woman. Laboratories always brought it back; the churned-up sexy excitement he'd felt when he was fifteen. These places were so cold and dull that it felt all the more illicit. He wanted to sit Molly up on one of those counters and kiss her. He wanted to have his hands on her. moving aside that white coat.

And then suddenly, Dr. Barlow arrived, bustling around the place doing his work. The lab was all buisnes now.

"I've got to go," Molly said at 3 am. She stood up and stretched same as she would rising

from a long sleep. "I want to get home and rest before I have to come back at 10am. I want to get out of this damn lab-coat for a while."

Molly out of that damn lab-coat, Sherlock got lost in that for a moment. Her lab-coat would carry the faint whiff of the lab, but it would mostly smell like her. She'd shed it at the door when she got home and leave it crumpled on the floor. Maybe she'd wash off the day with a hot shower and come out all warm and relaxed. Maybe. . .

Sherlock forced his mind back to his work. He had to finish and get the results to Scotland Yard before M.E. Anderson even figured out where to start his investigation.

Sherlock Holmes got home to his empty flat before 4 am. He hated keeping regular hours. Sleeping when everyone eles slept, eating breakfast in the morning, etc., long periods of this kind of time meant he wasn't working. What was he supposed to do with all that empty time?

As he'd told Molly, he was an appalling flatmate. He kept chemicals and body-parts in the fridge, sometimes unlabeled in the sort of plastic containers most people used for leftover pasta. He stank up the place with his experiments. He would lie, motionless, on the couch for hours at a time, no matter what was happening around him. It all made him an intolerable flatmate, he'd been told as much, even by Matthew who'd said it with a smile and stayed for almost a year. "My intolerable flatmate," that's the way he'd introduce him to his friends from the School of Economics who'd stop by with pizza and beer.

The only really objectionable thing about old Matt started when he fell in love with Isabelle, a tiny preschool teacher. Isabelle liked to have loud, bed-shaking sex at all hours of the night and refused to take it to her own place for fear of disturbing the her quiet "prudish" flatmate. Sherlock would hear them from his room, or even the hallway. The one time he'd thrown a shoe at the wall and yelled 'STOP IT!' wasn't addressed when he saw them in the morning.

When Sherlock came home that night, Matt was sitting at the kitchen table. It was very late for Matt, he must have had something to say.

"Sherlock, I think we need some kind of system. After last night, I think we need to figure out something."

What they figured out was that he didn't like having to hear howler-monkey-loud sex in his apartment and that Matt wanted to be able to have whatever kind of sex he wanted in his apartment. And that they both wanted the apartment and didn't want to find another flat-mate. What they decided was that Matt and Isabelle wouldn't have sex while Sherlock was around, or that they'd at least let him know it was time to put on the headphones.

Staying out of the flat was easy. Even when he wasn't working, he loved the city at night. Sound, sight smell. yes smell, it all kept his mind working. He observed strangers on the streets and in the subway, learning things they didn't expect anybody would know.

After growing up in "the country" or at school, after vacationing on beaches and mountains, he'd spent years at the university. That practically had a wall around it. He felt safest in the city because it was so active.

When Sherlock did get home from the moruge to the empty apartment, he flopped on the couch while he had the chance. Lastrad would be at his door as soon as he'd gotten the phone messages Sherlock had called in from the St. Bart's.

He thought about Molly sleeping alone in her tiny flat, what she slept in and what she did first thing in the morning. He thought about what her body really looked like and how he'd see her, still a mystery in a few hours. He thought about how he'd actually talked to her and how she didn't seem to think he was crazy. They would be back in the lab together again today.


	3. Chapter 3

Sherlock told people that Mycroft was "the smart one". Mycroft was more canny, more savvy. He could make roomfuls of strangers listen to him. He could make important people trust what he told them. Nor always the whole truth, not all that he knew, he told people what suited the situation.

Sherlock always said that Mycroft was "good at parties". He slid in smoothly and charmed everyone. He looked so right, that it didn't matter how handsome he actually was or wasn't Not everyone liked him, but he did impress them. Even when they'd been kids, that's how it was. Mycroft's birthday parties were huge; when he was fifteen, his parents had to lease a hotel ballroom for the event. Mycroft spent that evening going from one table to another talking briefly, if heartily, with everyone. Even as he watched the festivities, Sherlock knew that his elder brother was destined for a political career.

His own birthday celebration that year, Sherlock remembered as one of his best. His mother had taken Sherlock and two friends to the British Museum. He'd liked walking in the Museum with three people who accepted that he often didn't talk very much. He'd loved eating take-out vindalu and then going several streets away for perfect chocolate cake. The best part, by far, was riding the subway.

Sherlock was bad with crowds. No, actually, he loved crowds, the way he could slip in and out of them, the way they could carry him unseen. In a crowded office or lab, he had to be seen because there was nowhere to hide. It meant having to bump elbows with people, to make room.

Lestrad had i-med him, "See you in the morgue this AM. - G.L." "This AM " didn't mean much, but it was the same kind of message he would have left. Before he left, Sherlock had a warm shower with an unusually long wank.

Even when he was working, that's how he started the morning; by masterbating. All touch, he knew how his body responded. All physical memory and primitive brain; he didn't think about anyone or any body, usually. He just did it in the morning. This morning, he had anticipation, and imagination and the memory of a girl in a lab-coat. This morning, it wasn't just his usual wank, it was something exciting, so he gave himself more time.

When he reached the morgue, a crowd was forming. Inside already were DI Lestrade, a Sargent, M.E. Anderson, his assistant, Molly and one morgue attendant. Outside, Sherlock met Sally Donavan, who probably never knew that he respected her. Or he would, if it weren't for the way she treated herself. She was at least as smart as Lestrade, and somewhat more ready to question people's motives. For someone investigating murders, a little suspicion was good. She certainly questioned what he did. The way it must look to her is that he showed up at a murder scene when he had nothing better to do and solved the murder in whatever way he saw fit all the while being rude to anyone within range. She called him, " The Freak" because she said he enjoyed his work too much for someone who wasn't being rewarded for it. If that was what he saw, he would loath himself too.

And then there was her dirty little affair with that clod Anderson. Nobody understood why it was happening, but everyone knew that it was. Whenever his wife was out of town, people could tell by the way he would sidle up to her and stand way too close. They'd giggle, almost like school kids, almost because school kids were only trying to get something going behind their parent's' backs; they weren't planning something that would hurt someone one of them had sworn in front of a church-full of people he'd be faithful to forever. Everyone also knew when his wife was back in town because he would avoid her and she'd act resentful to the entire world and act distracted.

That morning, Sally waved Sherlock into the morgue with nothing but a scowl. He didn't mention it, it seemed unfair. It was best to just not see her.

Again, Sherlock stood at the door to the morgue, unable to move until somebody spoke. Over at a table, Anderson was talking to Molly! Anderson was smiling his most smarmy smile, and waving his hands about as if telling a story to a chum. Molly was smiling too, but not much. Everyone eles was filling up the space and waiting for something to happen.

"Hello Sherlock!" Molly turned and called to him.

Molly, back in a fresh white coat, she looked perfect. He could see that she was wearing jeans that day, the skinny kind which was the only kind women should wear. On himself, he hated jeans, mostly for the way they felt, and he hadn't owned a pair in years. On girls though, there he liked them. Under that lab-coat, Molly Hooper might have a cute, round bottom; who would know?

"Molly! Good morning Ms. Hooper, good to see you again."

There, he'd claimed her. He knew her, nobody eles in the room could say that.

"And you Sherlock; sleep well?"

"Not sleep; won't say that exactly." Well, what was it?

"Oh, I slept," she told the floor. She giggled. "Fell asleep soon as my head hit the pillow."

"One would hardly know you'd been out all night to look at you. You're not all baggy-eyed or anything"

Was this banter? Was this a chat?

"Hate to break this up," Lestrade sounded amused, and amazed. "We just have a few questions about exactly what you were doing here last night. Anderson says your results are a little suspect."

"Sloppy's what they are, you missed a step." Anderson practically yelled from the table. "And sloppy's fuckin' dangerous with this."

"Anderson, what happened to poor Sally out there? She looked too miserable to snark at me. I assume you did something horrible to her. "

Molly needed to know that the man who'd been chatting so cozily with her was horrible to women.

Anderson looked away quickly.

"Which is not what we'd expect from you." Lestrade talked as if he was standing between two fighting brothers. Just like Sherlock's own mother, a peacekeeper.

"My answer isn't sloppy, it just what happens if you change one thing. I did exactly what I meant to do. You just don't like my answer because it doesn't tell you what you assumed it would. My answer means work."

"We just have to check that answer for ourselves. That's why we're here."

One thing Sherlock had learned from living with his brother was that reasonable looked better than histrionics. Time to be the adult, before Anderson tried doing the same.

"Okay, check away. I'll show you what I got and how I got there/ Do you want to bother Molly here for a fresh body""

Sherlock knew that was plain unfair, dirty pool. Blood made the Inspecter vomit. He never got used to it, he puked up every time. Sally said it was sweet that somebody still cared, but she didn't say it in a kind way.

"I don't have one, not yet." Molly had turned to her work. Lestrade gave a little jump, like he'd forgotten she was there, "not the kind you'd need."

"What's the kind he'd need?" Was Anderson mocking her?

"A female, age 25-35, drug-free. Wasn't that it?"

"Good memory," he wanted to hug her, for two reasons. Could this bring them together?

"Were you here last night Ms. Hooper?" Lestrade again.

Molly was looking at the floor. She was twisting her hair. Maybe she didn't like crowds either.

"I had the night-shift, so I was here until three. Sherlock came in at almost eleven."  
>"That's a long time. And here you are again."<p>

"Yes."

"Tired?"

"Yes."

"You're new right?"

Why was Anderson going after her? Bastard!

"I just started this week."

"Miss Hooper was very helpful. She provided me with the perfect subject very quickly. Stop bullying her, you idiot!" Sherlock was not going to let them tear her to bits.

Truth was, he always enjoyed yelling at Anderson. He'd just look at him with those blank eyes, not defending himself.

"Did he tell you why he needed it?" He just kept going at her, stupid, cruel bastard.

"Said he wanted to run some experiments on the adrenal glands of a freshly dead woman. He said he was doing it to help you."

"To help us, really?" Lestrade was looking right at Sherlock.

"That's what he said."

"Did he tell you anything about these experiments?"

"No. He seemed like he was working very hard, like he knew what he was doing. He kept things very clean."

"So, he keeps it neat, and seems to know what he's doing?"

His tone mocked her, and she looked like she was starting to doubt herself. "That's what I saw.."

Sherlock caught her eye. He mouthed the words, "thank you."

"So Sherlock, your young friend brought you what you asked for. She says you seemed very diligant, and kept your work-space clean. Nobody but you knows what you were doing."

"I guess that we need to see those results." Lestrade broke in again, and for once Sherlock didn't resent him for it.

Sherlock knew that they would ask, but he hadn't expected it would take them this long. He just handed them over. It was all there, he would just let them take it in and see how right he was.

"Alright, I want to have a coffee." Molly sounded stronger than she had. Confident, or maybe just desperate to leave. "Anybody else want one?"

Sherlock wanted to go with her. In the river of moving people flowing to the cafeteria, he could tell how brave she'd been. He could thank her, he could apologize.

He moved toward her, she waited.

"You're staying, you're sitting down." Anderson called out.

Sherlock called our over his shoulder, "Of course I am. I just wanted to make sure Molly heard me. You know Molly, black two sugars."

He smiled, holding up two fingers like a peace-sign. Maybe she'd laugh, like it was their little joke.

When he sat back down, the other two might joke about his new friend. His alibi for the evening was practically a school-girl. Was this he trusted? Did he expect Lestrade would take that seriously? Sherlock knew he'd have to keep it cool in front of others.

Nights would be the time with Molly. Nights, the place could be empty. That way, he could enjoy being with her surrounded by memories of sex. He could really look at her, talk to her. They could drink hospital coffee and laugh. In a daylit room, things would have to be different. No-one could know how he felt about women in lab-coats.

Sherlock Holmes didn't "like" too many people. He was furiously loyal to some few, mostly the people who could tolerate him. He saw the good in them, and admired it. He enjoyed their company, usually one person at a time. He wanted to protect them. It was easier for him to be needed by someone than to need someone There were people he cared about in his own way, but sometimes they didn't even know it. Maybe Molly would figure it out.


	4. Chapter 4

"I'm a pathology intern, did you know that?"

Sherlock stood at the table preparing some slides. One thing he'd learned from his encounter with Anderson two mornings ago was that it took hard, unavoidable evidence to show him up properly.

Molly came up behind him and stopped.

She stood tall, even though she wasn't. Hair pulled back, lab-coat, clipboard; the usual Molly.

"Hello, Molly."

"I''ll be Molly Hooper, MD next year. There you are. Did you know that?"

He didn't know actually, he'd never wondered. She was Molly in the morgue. Sherlock felt horrible, really horrible.

"No, I'm sorry I didn't."

"Well, did you ever wonder?"

Sherlock tried to get himself together. Like when someone had knocks the wind out of him, he needed a moment to get his breath back. Then, it hurt.

"No, I never did wonder. I should have. "

"Well, you know now. And you can tell that Anderson too. He was talking as if he was out to humiliate me!"

"Oh, he was, believe me. He's what the Americans call 'an asshole.'." Shifting the blame to Anderson was both a relief and a pleasure. "I imagine you standing too close to me, it made you an automatic target."

"Hates you that much does he?" She gave a tiny giggle.

"He does, actually, lazy thinkers do. I insist that they examine their expectations, and that takes work."

Molly laughed again, more like she meant it this time. "He called me 'your young friend."

"Ahh, you heard that?"

"I wasn't even out the door"

Sherlock remembered Anderson saying that, but not what he said to that. He wished it had been something cutting. He turned a little and looked out the window. Not much to see, but he couldn't look at Molly. "Well, how old are you?"

"I'm twenty-six. I went straight through when I got to university. I didn't take a year off or anything. Straight through, I've spent most of my time in labs. That's basically the world I understand you know. I never went out much. Still don't."

"No, me neither. If I go out, it's basically to, you know, work." He pushed the hair off his forehead. He cursed his floppy curls, but women seemed to like them.

He wished she would ask him what that meant. He waited, nothing. He tried the smile. He pushed his hair off his forehead. Damn floppy hair!

"Thing is, I didn't know what you were doing, so I couldn't tell them anything the other day. All I could say was that you weren't sloppy. Isn't that what Anderson called your results?; 'sloppy'? If you'd told me what you were doing, I could tell them that you'd done everything right."

"Can you imagine the look on Anderson's face? When little you showed him up in front of everyone?" Sherlock enjoyed that image.

"Yes, little me."

Oh God, there he went again. He knew from her voice and the way that her eyes swept the floor that something had gone wrong. "Well, you're not very, er, tall are you?"

"No."

it was only a few seconds, but they were long ones. What was he supposed to say?

"Um, why are you here? Tonight, I mean. Still working on that case?"

"I am actually. It's the same one only this time, I'm working with skin left under the victims nails."

"Skin under the fingernails sounds pretty straightforward."

"It's the toenails actually, and not the victim's either. It's not that straightforward, I need as much hard evidence as I can get. After the other day, I want everything perfectly documented."

"Alright, we can do this, really show him up. Should we?" She sounded like a pushed-around kid ready for some revenge.

"Oh yes!"

Sherlock wasn't used to having an ally.

Molly came over and stood beside him. "Okay, where do we start? Tell me all about this experiment." She didn't exactly sound like someone on the verge of a clinical discovery. Her voice sounded soft.

She stood right beside him, Sherlock could smell her perfume. It was a barely-there, flowery smell, and it made him think of springtime. She was so close that their legs almost touched. He could brush her, and pretend it was an accident. At first.

Instead, there he was telling her all about slides, chemicals and toenails. What was he thinking? His brain and his imagination were working at cross-purposes.

The memory of being in the school lab with Joanne came back, only for a second. She'd kissed him to make him shut up. It sounded like a good idea. And yet, he couldn't stop talking. Was he this crazy-deterined to show up Scotland Yard and finish this case?

All very simple, she told him. And he was right, what he'd said, what he'd planned would work. He knew it would. The slides though, they needed work.

She still stood close, leaning a little across him. His hand fell lightly against the back of her leg. Sherlock liked women's' legs because they lead to other things. Again, she wore skinny jeans, not as smoothly alluring as stockings, but better than tights any day. Just a light, brushing touch; did she even notice? Maybe, maybe not.

Somewhat disappointing. Maybe she thought it really was just an accident. He tried something a little higher up, a little more lingering. When she turned toward him, his fingers trailed.

"Look," she moved away. "Were you just trying to. . . .?"

He'd never felt this kind of bad before; like some kind of cad. Could he recover? "Get your attention maybe? But no, I am so sorry. I don't know what I thinking . . . . "

"I don't know what I'm thinking either. I just want you to know some things. First , I'm just out of a very long relationship and I'm not exactly eager to get into another one. Second, I want to concentrate on finishing my degree. This isn't a good time for me to be. . . starting anything."

Sherlock just looked at her, trying to think of what to say.

"Listen to me, I'm going on about long-term relationships, and I don't even know what you want. Honestly, I must sound so. . . . "

Her voice had gotten higher, and she talked very fast.

"I don't know what I want. I'm not usually like that, I 'm much less," Much less what? "less forward than that. Please believe me. I do find you very attractive, but if that's not what you want. . . "

"Now." Molly cut in, "it's not what I want now. I mean, I'm flattered, beyond flattered. Any other time, I would love to get together with you. What I need right now are friends. Can you understand that?"

"Yes." Understanding didn't mean liking.

"Thing is, I am very attracted to you, but now is not the time for that. Please stay around."

Sherlock honestly didn't know what to say. "I am around. I'm always here."

Molly smiled. "Yeah, me too."

They moved around the morgue for the rest of the night. They finished the slides quickly, nobody saying much. At last, Sherlock gathered up his things and headed for the door.

"Good-night Molly. Thank you for your help." he said.

"G'night Sherlock. Glad I could help."

"Oh, this should stick it to Anderson."

Sherlock had one foot in the hallway when he heard her.

"Are you going to be here tomorrow?"

"Don't know. Half the time that I end up here I hadn't planned to come in."

"Yeah, well I'm usually here."

"We'll see each other."

Sherlock was almost out the door when he turned, He looked at Molly, she was wearing flat-heeled red shoes. "I like the shoes Molly."

She smiled. "Thank you."

"Off to Oz are you?"

Silence.

But wait; red shoes, off to Oz. It made sense to him. He let the door close behind him. If it sounded ambigus to her, he didn't mind.

Sherlock went straight home. For the first time in days, he left the morgue without wondering where Molly would go after work.

**Please review this. I'd like to know what everybody thinks. Thank you.**


	5. Chapter 5

People at Saint Bart's liked Molly Hooper. In the morgue, they practically worshipped her because she seemed to love her work. She was fastidious about her work. She seemed to enjoy the night shift, and she would often trade her day-shift with a colleague who preferred more work-day hours. She was the most dedicated intern in the hospital. Everything about Molly was dependable.

Sherlock knew this because he heard it when a case took him to the hospital. In her first months at St Bart's, Molly wasn't at work in the morgue, she was a topic of conversation there. She's a wonder! Best intern we've ever had down here! He agreed, always. He'd smile to himself and feel happy for her.

To other women, Molly was a project. A real fixer-upper. To them, she seemed to need a little work. She could be so pretty, they all said right to her, if she'd only fix her hair, buy more stylish clothes or put on a little make-up. And she needed to get out more. To this end, the nurses and interns would walk down to the morgue some Friday nights and sweep her along with them. Carry her away almost.

It felt that way to Sherlock; like the woman would barge into the morgue and carry away Molly. Sometimes he'd just be coming in hoping to see her when as she was getting ready to leave. Once, she was wearing golden high-heeled sandas. Heels so high and slender, and with straps criss-crossing up her ankle, he couldn't take his eyes off them.

"Molly, those shoes are," he tried to think of what they were, "stunningly high for someone as

small as you."

"Yeah, I've had them for months, and I've never worn them. There's no use having cute shoes you don't wear; is there?" She laughed, but she sounded like a school-girl called on unprepared.

"They're very nice; make you look taller."

Stupid, stupid, stupid!; he'd just reminded her how small she was, and praised the shoes that made her look taller. Could he sound more brainless?

"if you saw me, what would you say?"

When he'd been a kid, his party trick had been playing the violin. For years now, people would insist he provide the entertainment by asking him what he could deduce about strangers.

"I'd say Molly that you were a serious young woman out for a carefree night out. I would think that your old-fashioned scent doesn't match your shoes. I would think. . . . "

Oh, he was rolling now. He would think that she really loved her fancy shoes. He would think that she wanted to look like something she wasn't.

He'd think that she wanted to impress people. If she already had somebody impressed, he would have come along and picked her up an hour ago and taken her somewhere. Not dancing, of course; Molly Hooper could not dance in those shoes.

Molly's eyes looked huge. "No, wait; my old-fashioned what?"

"Scent Molly, scent. You don't wear perfume do you? I noticed this months ago. You use scented soap. It's floral, pretty, but not really modern. Your shoes are gold high-heeled sandals. Going out shoes."

Molly, looking stricken, nodded.

"You look like a young woman going out on Friday night, you smell like a lady at a garden party, and not necessarily a young one either."

Molly still hadn't said a thing. Sherlock felt horrible. She could make him feel this way.

She could also make him furious. That made sense didn't it? Two weeks after telling him that she didn't want start something with him, she'd started dating a young lawyer she'd met on a night out like this one. It didn't last, but that didn't matter. He was furious, sometimes so furious that he got horrible. This time, he looked at her face, and stepped back a little.

"Now as I said the shoes are really something, and I've always like the lilac soap, they're just an odd pairing."

Molly let out a breath. "Odd pairing, okay."

"Odd. Not bad, I've just never seen it."

"Or smelled it?"  
>Sherlock's laugh was both nervous and forced. "Or smell it, exactly. It's only you Molly."<p>

There, that didn't sound unkind, did it? It was out there. There was no need to say that he'd loved the smell of lilacs all his life; no need to mention the sexy shoes or her legs.

The two of them stood where they were, then moved apart. Both had something to occupy themselves, some reason for being in the morgue after 9pm on Friday. They could always work alone together. Sherlock always appreciated that about Molly; she left him alone if that's what he wanted. He also liked it when she brought him coffee without his asking for it.

Sherlock didn't always go to the morgue to work alone. Sometimes he went because he knew he needed some help, or at least someone who'd understand what he was doing.

Molly Hooper not only understood what he was doing, she knew how important it was. Sherlock had been creeping into this morgue to get his work done for years already, and Molly was the only one there who didn't seem to think he was crazy. To everyone eles, he was suspect; he was that weird one who came in late at night looking for a spare dead body and claiming to be doing a favor for Scotland Yard. Molly treated him like someone who had come for a reason. She asked what he needed; Molly was one who knew among the recently deceased had left their bodies to science, because someone always did. She listened to what he told her, and sometimes she had suggestions. Nobody eles in the hospital understood that he hated cutting into the bodies of the almost healthy, but that he did it because he needed to figure out something.

That Friday night, he had brought his own samples. Straight from the crime-scene, he had gum scraped off the shoe of a dead fourth-form girl from the nearest school. There was still some left on the shoe; there for the boys from Scotland Yard to find if they looked. He was in the morgue to run some tests which he might have been able to perform back in his own flat, Maybe he'd been hoping for some company.

"What are you doing here tonight?" He'd busied himself with setting up by the time she spoke. "Anything interesting?"

"I'll be leaving soon; going out for once. Should be fun. And you?"

"I've got a case, it looks like a good one. Molly, did they bring in that girl that they found behind the school? Have you got her here?"

"They did. I worked on her myself, poor kid. I couldn't let you look at the body, we've been through this before."

"I know, I know. I have what I want with me; it was right on her shoe."

"On her shoe?" Molly sounded intrigued. Was it enough to make her stay? She walked to be back of the room where he was working.

"Right on her shoe. She had fresh bubblegum on the sole of her shoe, near the toe."

Sherlock held up the plastic bag containing the sample.

"So, what do you know?; except that people spit their gum out on the playground. Pretty disgusting if you ask me."

"But, this gum wasn't on the ground long. It's fresh, it still smells minty. It's still soft. You can feel sugar-crystals in it, so it hasn't been chewed very long. Most importantly, it can be a source of teeth-marks and saliva samples not belonging to the victim."

Good. He rarely got the chance to trot out this much information.

"And you know it can't be her's because she wore braces on her teeth."

"Exactly Molly. That girl had a mouth full of wire and rubber-bands. There is no way this gum came out of her mouth. Who's is it?; that's what I need to find out. I could use your help."

Sherlock knew that Molly wouldn't stay. Young women in gold sandals go out with the girls on Friday night; they don't examine gum for D.N.A. samples, no matter how fresh it was or how pristine the teethmarks looked.

"I can't, no way. Sorry."

"Didn't think so."

Sherlock turned back to his samples, and Molly started writing on a chart. It wasn't worth trying to entice her to stay.

When Molly looked at the clock, she looked conflicted; didn't she? "There's the time."

"There it is. Where are you going tonight Molly?; not just down to the pub."

"No. I don't know really. The girls are taking me out to celebrate my graduation."

"You graduated?"

"Oh yeah, last week. First in my year. You've got to call me Dr. Hooper now."

"I'll remember that from now on." Sherlock tried the enigmatic smile. "Congratulations Dr. Hooper."

Molly moved toward the door. "Thank you very much. It still feels like a lot of title for me."

Molly shed her lab-coat and hung it on a peg by the door. He'd seen her without one before, but it always surprised him. Pink, that was the first think he took in; it was a pink dress printed with flowers. A short dress, with straps; The going-out dress he'd seen her wear that Winter had shown him how small her breasts were, but this one didn't remind him. As she turned toward him, the layers of filmy fabric in the skirt swirled.

"I like your party dress Molly."

"Thank you! Does it match the scent or the shoes?"

Ummm. What was it? "Both. That dress matchs both."

"Why, thank you!" Molly giggled a little bit.

Next thing Sherlock knew, Molly had undone her ponytail. He'd seen her hair down before, but he'd never seen it coming down. It was longer than he remembered, and a little wavy. Had it always fallen past her shoulders like that?

The first time Sherlock had seen Molly, she had reminded him that he'd always found lab-coats, and labs sexy. It had all come back to him, and he'd stood in the doorway, stunned, He didn't feel that way again, but, briefly, he remembered feeling it. Lab-coats would always be sexy, on girls.

Suddenly he heard the sounds of high-heeled shoes and women's laughter in the hallway. It grew louder.

He had a moment, only a moment. What should he say. "And congratulations again, on your graduation. The hospital is lucky to have have you here, and so am I."

"Sherlock, it's not often you say sweet things, but sometimes you do."

That was when the door opened. Six women came in, all wearing brightly-colored dresses.

"Molly, ready to go?" The first in the door, all in red was Sasha Morgan, an attending from Pediatrics, Sherlock met her last year when an almost-murder almost-victim was in her ICU for three weeks. She eventually stopped told him to stop hanging about waiting for the little girl to come out of her coma, maybe she just got used to him.

"Umm, yeah, let me just get my bag."

Her tiny, tall heels ticked crisply across the floor. The wee gold bag on the looked large enough for keys, lipstick and a phone. Maybe a condom and a toothbrush too, and Sherlock cursed himself for observing that.

"Hey Sherlock," Sasha nodded in his direction.

"Sasha," he smiled quickly. He could spend days in the hospital without anything more friendly or respectful.

Molly walked to the door, bag on her arm. "Goodnight Sherlock, good luck with your experiments and all."

The others giggled. He half expected that.

"Thank you Dr. Hooper. You'll read about the case this weekend, and you'll know about the experiments. Even though they might not make it into the paper."

"Oh, I know how it goes."

And she was gone. Pity, it had been shaping up to be a good night in the morgue.

**Is this the End? I'd love to hear what you think. Thanks!**


	6. Chapter 6

Some days, he could barely stand to look at her. Molly Hooper knew what Sherlock didn't know, she was the only person at Saint Bart's who did. Most of the doctors and nurses only saw him as he arrived or as he left, so for weeks at a time, Molly might be the only person he saw. To many, he could easily just be a rumor. They might whisper, "Sherlock Holmes was here last night," but Molly Hooper would know that he'd been there and what he'd done. They could work together all night, and then avoid each other for a week.

"That's not right," she told him after he'd spent hours testing pubic-hair samples for chemical residue. "You'll have to do it again."

The worst part was that she stood there in front of him eating BBQ flavored crisps. "I'm not sure it's going your way, even if you do the whole thing over. Has Anderson at the Yard told you anything?"

"He says that the evidence suggests that the deaced had recently had sex with the subject. Recently as in last night, I mean."

Molly licked two of her fingers and put her whole hand into the crisps bag. Digging around for the last sweet, salty red crumbs? Really Molly!

"Is that what you found?"

"That's what I found, but I wasn't looking for it."

"Well, what were you looking for?"

She still had the bag in her hand as she told him how to find what he needed. Like she was still thinking about salty-crispies. Molly loved the salty-crispies.

That night, he did what she told him, but he didn't always. This time, he got what he wanted, but that didn't always happen. There were nights in the morgue when he just couldn't make it work. Nobody but Molly would know about those nights, but she would.

"You were right. You did what you could with what you had," she told him after the long night of pubic hair. "It's Scotland Yard's loss if they don't want to use it."

Was this the kind of moment where two exhausted co-workers hugged or something? They'd never done anything like that; they hadn't touched since that one time. He suspected that Molly was a hugger, and that wouldn't be so bad. Right then, he wouldn't, he would not be consoled.

She looked at him, all puppy-dog eyes, like she wanted him to see that she felt bad for him.

"It's aggravating, that's what it is." Well, it was. Five hours of work, and he could prove that the hair had been cut off, but he couldn't link it to the nail scissors that cut it. And what would that prove? He couldn't make it prove anything, although he felt sure it would.

"Sorry," she said again.

Damn sorry, and big brown eyes, and Molly Hooper! Sherlock worked in silence for then until he left. He refused her offers of coffee or crisps.

He kept out of the hospital until the next week. Once he did come back, he avoided her. He had to practically swerve right into her before he said anything.

"Sherlock!" Her voice was high and excited. "Hey there! How are you?"

"Hey Molly," he said over his shoulder and kept right on walking.

She fancied him, he knew it. Or she could. Hadn't she practically said that one night? She said she found him attractive, but she didn't want to start anything right then.

She behaved exactly the way that a young women who fancied somebody is supposed to behave. Listened to everything he said, laughed at what she seemed to imagine were his jokes. Sent long, meaning-loaded looks his way. Seemed always waiting for him to say something.

In the morgue, things were different. That was her world. She belonged there, ran the place, knew what she was doing. That was where he'd first seen her, been impressed by her. On that night, she had been a mystery woman in a white lab-coat. She'd brought it all back to him, the way that he'd felt about labs since he was in school.

The whole thing about labs had started when Sherlock was fifteen. It started a seventeen year old girl with wild red hair and fabulous breasts, a girl who wore lipstick every day, tasted like rasberries and chocolate, and was almost nothing like Molly Hooper.

"I've paid rent for the last time!" Molly was announcing as Sherlock entered the morgue that morning. "At least, I hope I have."

The door had barely closed behind him, so Sherlock guessed she was talking to someone eles. He scanned the room, and found Dr. Mike Stanford.

Sherlock knew that Dr. Mike Stanford wasn't older than he was, not more than a few years anyway, but he didn't feel that way. Mike Stanford lived on Notting Hill with his lovely wife and their twins, aged three. He taught at the medical school and ran the morgue. Molly was a better pathologist, but she hadn't been there long enough to run the place.

"Is that right? The end of rent?"

"I hope it is. I just put in an offer on a condo last night." Molly turned around, "hello Sherlock."

"Hello Molly."

"So, you'll soon be a homeowner." Mike sounded like the welcoming committee. "Cheers, Molly."

"Maybe that's just what I want; to own a home. I've been renting or living in dorms for ten years. I've never lived anywhere for more than two years. Never had a wall to paint, never hung curtains. I'm sick of it. I need my own place."

"Sounds like me." Sherlock knew that he'd said it, did anyone hear it? Did he want them to? "I've been going from one flat to another since Oxford. I've lived all over this city for a year at a time. I've had eleven flatmates."

"Eleven, I can beat that! I've had thirteen flatmates, but then there have been two times when I'd lived with two other girls at once."

"In my first year of Medical School, there were four of us in one flat." Mike sounded eager not to be forgotten. "I had to sleep on the couch in the front room. A hellish year of course, but I'm still chums with those chaps. Two of them were in my wedding."

"I've been two flatmates weddings," Molly said. "

Sherlock had never been in anyone's wedding party, and it took him a moment to figure out what Mike and Molly were talking about. He had attended the wedding of one former roommate; Matthew, the only one who stayed for more than a year. He stayed two and a half very good years. Of all the flatmates Sherlock Holmes had ever had Matt from the School of Ecconomics was the most ordinary; he kept 9-5 hours, worked toward a nice secure job, and married his cute girlfriend Isabel. He watched the World Cup, cheering loudly for England, and consumed lots of pizza and beer. He was the only flatmate Sherlock ever missed.

When Molly said she'd never been in a flat where she painted a wall or hung curtains, Sherlock thought he knew what she meant. The places he'd lived all felt like places you weren't meant to stay very long; like places you stopped on the way to some other place. All this was just fine with him, until he'd seen that Mrs. Hudson's flat in Baker Street was up for rent.

He'd always liked the neighborhood, nice and centeral. People really lived in that neighborhood, people stayed. Sherlock often walked there, and he often slowed down near 221. Maybe he hoped that his old friend would see him as he past and insist he come in for tea, maybe it just felt like a respectful thing to do.

"FURNISHED FLAT FOR RENT," read the sign. Below this, was a phone number and the words, "SERIOUS INQUIRIES ONLY".

Sherlock had seen that furnished flat with its crazy wallpaper and experienced leather chairs, and he wanted that apartment. He loved the idea of living there; that was a place he would want to stay. He could easily get out of the flat where he was living, just pick up his things and go.

He imagined that Martha Hudson would be glad to have him move in. He wasn't just flattering himself; hadn't she told him the place was his for the asking more than once?

"Either of you know anyone looking for a flatmate?" He was a little surprised to hear his words ringing out in the morgue.

"A flatmate?" Stanford soundly frankly amused. "Students are always looking for flatmates, but other than that, no. Would you consider living with a student?"

"No!" Sherlock announced. "When you say 'student' you're talking about a grubby, careless kid who somehow gets boot-prints on the walls, sloshs bong-water on the floor and messes with the thermostats. There is no way I'm sharing 221B Baker Street with a student. I need someone reliable and civilized. I need someone who isn't bound by the school-year and can be counted upon for his half of the rent."

"I hate to tell you this Sherlock, but students are about the only people who are looking to share a flat these days. I know two families who are interested in sharing a nanny, but not with each other; please don't ask."

"Trust me, I wouldn't dream of asking."

"But wait," Sherlock couldn't miss it, Stanford bounced on the balls of his feet as he spoke. "Molly, you know someone. Aren't you moving out on someone, or hoping to?"

Sherlock wondered if she shouldn't be offended by the certenty in Molly's voice. "I'm about to have an ex-flatmate, but I wouldn't do that. She wouldn't take him."

Big silence. Molly started talking again, fast.

"She doesn't live with men; she's said as much. No matter what I told her about him. She wouldn't. . . . "

"I can't imagine you'd be able to recommend me," Sherlock spoke quickly too. He wanted to get away, far away from this idea.

The closest he'd ever been to having a woman as a flatmate was when Matt's girlfriend Isabel all but moved into their apartment. She wasn't actually so bad, not really anyway. She didn't clutter up the bathroom with hair-care products any more than had any flatmate Sherlock had ever had. She made better-than-decent coffee every morning and never moved any of his experiments. The only things he really didn't like about having Isabel around the place was not being able to avoid hearing her and Matt having crazy-loud sex most nights and Sunday mornings and then acting like he hadn't heard a thing when he saw Isabel at breakfast.

"You've always told me that you keep very weird hours, and my flatmate wouldn't want that, she complains about me banging around the place when I come in late."

"You're an Attending doctor in an urban hospital. What did she expect?" Sherlock had long ago given up being shocked at the obsurvations people failed to make, but this seemed extreme.

It was; Molly and Mike Stanford were both nodding. "I know! I told her on the first day that I often work nights, so I don't know what she was expecting. And there'f the stuff you bring home, there's no way Cassie would put up with that."

"Shut up Molly!"

It had come out while the other two were giggling; it came out deep and loud.

Mike Stanford stared, and Molly seemed to shrink a little.

Finally, Stanford asked, "The stuff he brings home?"

"I run experiments at night Stanford, I guess any flat-mate would have to get used to that about me. I've got equiptment that I set up and, . . . . "

Stanford was clearly a few steps behind, and catching up at his own pace. "You bring things home? Like what?"

Sherlock looked at Molly and smiled. She smiled back too, and he was relieved. She'd recently sent him home with fresh bag of. . . . "eyes."

"Eyes," Molly said it too, half a second after Sherlock did.

Stanford looked from one to the other, "eyes?"

"Stanford, when did you learn how eyes can be made to dilate? Did you learn about dilation and water? And chemicals? Where did you get your eyes Stanford?" Sherlock knew that he could talk fast and that this sometimes unbalanced people.

"What I know about eyes I learned using cadaver eyes in Medical School." Stanford was almost whispering.

"Well, I never went to Medical School, and I recently had to know about what makes eyes dilate. So..."

So, it hung there, it just hung until. . . .

Molly rescued him. "He came in here for a pickle-bottle full of eyes in saline."

"Four eyes, two pairs," Sherlock laughed, and so did she, "all blue."

This was a reason that he liked the morgue; the whole place, anything that happened there could be just between the two of them. When it was just them, it was a relief to come in; no need for pretending or small talk, it's just Molly. Molly who just let him work, laughed at corpse humor, saved her body-parts all for him and forgave him pretty quickly when he had to tell her to shut up. It was their place, their secret. It was as intimate a space as Sherlock Holmes had ever shared.

"Well, look at the pair of you, laughing! It seems like you take him as he is Molly." Mike Stanford was laughing on his own. He really seemed to want to be part of something. "Maybe she should be your flat-mate. Have you asked her?"

Ask her? Ask Molly? Ask her to share the Baker Street flat?

Sherlock looked at Molly, and somebody had already asked the question. More giggling from both of them.

"Umm," might as well give it a go. "I need a flat mate for a lovely old place in central London. If the offer on this condominium falls through. . . . ."

"Lovely old placea are lovely, but I want somewhere with totally new up-to-date everything. Just me and my cat, Toby in our new place with all new heat and hot water."

"New heat and hot water? That's fine. Landlady lives on the first floor, and the dear old thing is a creature of comforts. I'd bet it has the best and newest heat and hot."

"Oh well then. . . ."

"There's a fireplace for reading by; do you enjoy reading by the fireplace?" Sherlock could see Molly reading by the fire in the Baker Street apartment. All cozy, with a comforter and a cuppa. He'd be there too.

"I think I would." Did she see the same thing?

"I thought that you might. It has two big windows in the front for watching the street."

"Do you watch the street much?" asked Stanford.

"Yes," Sherlock replied. "That's one of the quieter things I like to do when I get bored. I also play the violin late at night, and wander around London at night. I'm not an easy flat-mate, but I am looking for someone who'll tolerate me. "

"I hope I can see this place on Baker Street," Molly told him, "even if I don't move in."

Sherlock smiled, "I've called the landlady, and she and I are having tea today. I expect some sort of good result. She's told me more than once that it's mine for a fair price. I may go into debt to live in Baker Street, but the place seems to be my fate."

"Well, who knows Holmes?; I may find you a flat-mate today."

"You may indeed. Thank you."

Stanford gave a little wave and was gone.

"Sherlock, why are you here?" Molly asked. "Are you just bored?"

Sherlock was taken aback. He gave the little hair-flip and smile that Molly always seemed to like. It didn't do much.

"Yes Molly, I'm bored! Scotland Yard isn't calling me in about the linked suicides, even after I tried to get their attention at that press-conference. I've got to do something! Have you got anything for me? Anybody dedicate their remains to science?"

"Maybe", Molly started moving around the morgue, busying herself with the remains stretched on tables. "I'll check, I promise."

Sherlock didn't have to fake gratitude to Molly; he hid it sometimes, but he never bothered faking it. "Thank you Molly! We have a little time. I think the day has come for that test for post-mortem bruising I've been wanting to do."

"Testing post-mortem bruising, that sounds like a fine way to fill a slow afternoon." Molly interested, just what he wanted. "As if there were slow afternoons around here."

It wasn't every day that Sherlock brought his riding-crop with him to St. Bart's, but he carried it today in the inside pocket of his overcoat. For something so thin and light, it had many uses. It was a weapon no-one expected, and he carried it everywhere when he suspected he might be being followed. He'd already used it to show that injuries to a dead body were not the same as injuries to a dying body. He'd hoped today would be the day for the bruises experiment, so he'd brought it.

This was going to be fun!


End file.
